


the truth or a Pomeranian

by seek_its_opposite



Category: The X-Files
Genre: (but much later this time), Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Episode: s03e22 Quagmire, Episode: s04e20 Small Potatoes, Episode: s06e15 Arcadia, F/M, Post-Episode: s08e16 Three Words, queequeg died sweetie
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-12
Updated: 2018-11-12
Packaged: 2019-08-22 13:39:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,688
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16598915
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/seek_its_opposite/pseuds/seek_its_opposite
Summary: It occurs to them both too late that nice suburban couples don’t have dogs named after Melville characters.





	the truth or a Pomeranian

**Author's Note:**

> from a tumblr prompt: AU where Queequeg survives their trip to Georgia

1.

Scully’s father taught her how to swim and how to find the North Star. He quizzed her on the 50 state capitals (Scully, flushed with exhaustion after a late-night stakeout, once recited them all for Mulder in an empty diner, a decibel too loud, her hands so expressive she almost knocked over her coffee) and sailing knots (she laced up Mulder’s boots when his arm was in a sling and he lost feeling in his toes). Her father showed her how to drive a boat, which she really is a natural at, she swears, alligators aside.

There’s water pooling between Mulder’s toes when they get back to their motel, one $500 deposit later, to find Scully’s indignant Pomeranian chewing through a throw pillow. Mulder remembers what else she said her father taught her:  _Respect nature because it has no respect for you._

Scully, remembering the same, just sighs and takes a shower.

Later, with wet hair and a dry sweatshirt, she takes the dog into the yard to do his business before the long drive, and Mulder leans on the door frame and imagines a whole new natural order. He imagines Scully on vacation, driving the Blue Ridge Parkway with the windows down and never shivering with him on a rock in the dead of night. He shouldn’t have joked about cannibalism. He’s already consuming her, a little more every day.

Out in the clearing, Queequeg yelps, and with one swift tug he pulls free of Scully’s grasp and sprints toward the tree line, his leash dangling behind him. Scully takes off running after her blurry pet, and Mulder takes off running after her, all three of them disappearing into the woods like a children’s book.

They catch up to each other at the edge of the lake, Queequeg yapping at the waves. Scully scoops her pet into her arms.

“What were you thinking?” she asks her dog, in a tone Mulder knows well. He puts his hand on her shoulder.

They’re turning away from the shore when something splashes behind them. Mulder glances back at the water, grabs Scully’s arm, and squeezes tight.

“Scully,  _look_.”

They spin around in tandem, just in time to see a long neck rising out of the waves.

Queequeg makes the drive back to D.C. on Mulder’s lap, like a conquering hero.

 

2.

After that, Mulder keeps a bag of treats in his glove compartment, pocketing one or two every time he shows up at her door. But when he comes knocking late one Friday night with his hair in his eyes and a bottle of wine in his hand, there are no treats and no Kleenex in his pocket, and Queequeg growls, nipping at his heels.

The cops are already taking him away when Mulder, the real Mulder, shows up, out of breath. His palms are black and blue.

“How did you know?” he asks Scully, kneeling before her on the couch. She clasps her hands around her shins, hugging them closer.

“You were terrible to Queequeg,” she says, and surprises even herself when she laughs.

He sits with her for hours, her on the couch and him on the floor, coaxing her dog out of the corner with treats to win him back as Scully gradually uncoils. It’s after midnight when, sleepy and reclined, she reaches out to brush her fingertips against his shoulder.

“Mulder, you’ll take care of him, right? When I’m gone?”

He almost chokes. Her eyes are closed and her arm flops over the edge of the couch, easy and trusting. She looks so comfortable, healthy. If he prayed, he’d be down on his knees begging for a way to turn shape-shifting inward: not to make himself look like someone else, but to make reality line up with how it already looks. To be the kind of man who comes over to see her on Friday after work just  _because_.

He squeezes her hand. When he weaves her fingers into his, he can’t feel his own bruises.

 

3.

She lives, and lives again. They get the X-Files back only to wind up packing Lacoste polos and pearl earrings for a trip to the suburbs. He waits for his life to stop feeling like an illusion.

“We should take Queequeg,” Scully says, her hair curling around her ears. “Help us look the part.”

Mulder agrees. He’d say yes to anything she asks for right now, with the keys to the basement in his pocket and a matching set in hers. Nothing about this case seems like an X-File anyway, so the dog shouldn’t be in any danger.

(There’s also this: He likes the idea that even one part of their real life makes them look like a happy couple.)  

It occurs to them both too late that nice suburban couples don’t have dogs named after Melville characters. They explain his namesake, and explain it again. Queequeg, their perfect alibi, hates Scruffy and yaps at him all through dinner. They don’t get much information out of the Schroeders.

Still, when they trade off late-night walks, or when he brings her coffee in the morning and Queequeg jumps on the bed, Mulder sees them from a distance, like he’s watching someone else’s home videos on the camcorder: Scully and Mulder and their wet-nosed pet, the picture of domesticity.

He remembers her a year ago speaking low and sweet to her daughter, asking if she liked dogs.

 

4.

In truth, they don’t know how old Queequeg is and are both privately surprised he makes it this long. He goes grey around the snout and catches less air during games of fetch, but he remains otherwise as stubborn as ever.

A week after Scully kisses Mulder on the couch with his arm in a sling, she comes back to his place with her overnight bag under one arm and her dog under the other, and she doesn’t leave all weekend. He remembers the old wisdom about dogs and their owners. He loves her relentlessness fiercely; he never dreamed it would look like this, like her hand clutching a fistful of his sheets as she sleeps.

Maybe it was always this simple. Maybe they never had to make their lives look like anything else.

Warm and worn out, they stay in bed so late on Saturday morning that Queequeg whines in the doorway. Mulder regards the dog with a finger over his lips as he fumbles for his jeans.

Scully stirs and pushes herself up on one elbow. The sheet slips from her shoulders; she is perfect, perfect. He leans over to brush the hair out of her eyes.

“Don’t move a muscle,” Mulder tells her, tapping her cheek. “Don’t ever move.

“I’ll be right back.”

 

5.

There are still scars on his cheeks, three on each, like cold fingers grabbed his face and pulled. Queequeg rarely leaves his dog bed anymore and hasn’t begged for treats since Mulder’s return. The truth is there are none in his pocket.

Scully calls, her voice measured, and asks him to come right away. When he asks if she’s hurt, if it’s the baby, she says no, she’s fine, but he does need to hurry.

He finds her on the couch with Queequeg beside her, stroking the dog’s head and whispering something soothing.

“Scully, what’s wrong?”

“It’s time, Mulder,” she says, not looking up. “I’ve called the vet.”

“Queequeg?”

“I can bring him in anytime today. I thought—” She catches her breath. “I thought you’d want to say goodbye.”

She can’t stop herself from crying any longer, and Mulder, who until now has been hovering a few feet inside the door, finally comes over to kneel before her, offering a tissue like a white flag. She takes it and forces a wobbly smile.

“I’m sorry,” she sniffs.  

“Scully, what are you sorry for, honey?” He puts his hand on her knee.

“You just got back,” Scully cries, wiping her eyes. “You shouldn’t have to be around death right now. Maybe this was a bad idea.”

“No, Scully, no.” He shakes his head and fumbles for understanding. He was dead and now she’s pregnant and her dog is dying, and he can’t seem to stop saying her name. “Scully… I would never want you to go through this alone.”

He remembers too late that she already went through this alone with him. With his body.

He reaches out to pat Queequeg behind the ears.

“He’s been sick for a while, Mulder. I did what I could.”

“I’m sorry I wasn’t here,” he says. He’s looking at the dog. Scully shivers.

He drives her to the vet with her dog in her lap. He drives her home and holds her hand.

Later, he sits beside her on the couch, the air unstable between them. Her fingers and his are wrapped around separate mugs of hot tea, and Scully closes her eyes and inhales the steam. Her place is quiet, shadowy.

“He was a good dog, Scully,” Mulder says. “I mean, aside from that time he ate his owner.”

Scully breathes out a half laugh, eyes still closed. “That wasn’t his fault, Mulder.”

“Still. I’m glad he never ate you.”

“I’m touched.” She opens her eyes.

“Remember,” he sets down his mug and rubs his hands together, “when he found Big Blue for me?”

“I still can’t believe you didn’t tell anyone,” she says. “After all that.”

She reaches to place her drink beside his, straining over her belly.

“Scully.” He almost gasps. It’s the most obvious thing in the world; how can she not know? “I didn’t have to tell anyone. You were there.”

He takes the mug from her hands, gently, and puts it on the table. Scully starts to smile and suddenly she’s crying, hot and silent.

“Hey,” he leans over, wiping his thumb across her cheek. “Hey, Scully.” She shudders at his touch, then buries her wet nose on his shoulder and whispers things he can’t yet understand. He repeats her name into her hair, over and over.

Her father taught her that everything dies. Her mother taught her to believe in resurrection.


End file.
